US pre-open: Stocks seen mostly lower as Trump says he's ready to hit all Chinese imports with tariffs

US futures pointed to a mostly weaker open on Wall Street on Friday as President Trump ramped up his trade war rhetoric, although Microsoft was set to boost the tech sector after solid earnings, while General Electric also looked poised to rise on the back of well-received earnings.

At 1200 BST, Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 futures were down 0.4% and 0.2%, respectively, but Nasdaq futures were up 0.2%.

Trade war concerns were likely to take centre stage again after CNBC released its full interview with US President Trump, having only put out the section on the Federal Reserve on Thursday.

As it turns out, not only did Trump criticise the Federal Reserve's interest rate rises and make it clear he wants a weaker dollar, he also said he was "ready to go to $500bn" if China doesn't bow to US complaints about its trade policies.

Markets.com analyst Neil Wilson pointed out that Dow futures dropped back below the key 25,000 level and the S&P 500 gave up around ten points to trade below the psychologically important 2,800 level after the Trump headlines came out.

"Looks like it might be a bad end to the week for equities although we could always get some clarification from Trump before the day is out that calms things down," he said.

As far as Trump's comments about the Fed and the dollar are concerned, Oanda analyst Craig Erlam said: "It’s quite clear to most people that part of the reason for the Fed raising rates at the current pace is the tax reform measures passed at the end of last year, when the economy was already running hot.

"This is also partially responsible for the dollar rising against other currencies, particularly the yuan and euro, which has suffered further as the President has sought to start a trade war with both. Trump is not one to accept responsibility for such events and now appears to be actively trying to push the blame onto others in a clear attempt to halt the rise in the greenback, the strengthening of which could weigh on the economy and soften the impact of the trade measures he is taking against other countries."

In corporate news, General Electric rose in pre-market trade after its second-quarter earnings and revenue beat analysts' expectations. Earnings per share came in at 19 cents versus expectations of 18 cents, while revenue of $30.1bn was ahead of the $29.4bn analysts had pencilled in.

Software giant Microsoft looked set to gain at the open after the company's quarterly revenue and profit late on Thursday surpassed analysts' expectations. Fourth-quarter profit rose to $8.87bn or $1.14 a share, beating a forecast of $1.08 while sales rose 17% to $30.1bn versus expectations of $29.2bn.

The solid performance was driven by an increase in sales for the group's flagship Azure clouding computing business and good growth for its productivity and business processes unit.

On the downside, Skechers was weaker in pre-market trade after the footwear company's second-quarter same-store sales and earnings missed expectations.